One Belt One Road Development Status Seminar

The seminar named “One Belt One Road Development Status” was co-organized by One Belt One Road Research Institute of Chu Hai College of Higher Education, Institute for Entrepreneurship (IfE) of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) and Silk Road Economic Development Research Center on 30 Jun 2017. The first speaker was Mr. Joseph N.K. Chan (Chairman, Silk Road Economic Development Research Center; Principal Director & Founding Partner, Oriental Patron Financial Group) and he shared his experience on the business in One Belt One Road countries.

Mr. Joseph Chan said One Belt One Road is not a new thing in China. In 1950s, China supported the third world countries such as Africa for foundation construction. Then he pointed out many weaknesses in Hong Kong and SMEs that no policy or financial organization supported and SMEs short sight requested ROI within 3 years. In China banks and enterprises, they considered on 15 to 20 years development. Then he analyzed Hong Kong role on One Belt One Road policy in the following 3 ways and also pointed the limitation:
i)     Finance (If you have business with One Belt One Road countries, you may not establish account in Hong Kong’s banks because of high risk business)
ii)   Professional Service (The cost is too high for those developing countries)
iii)  Travel (Language problem especially in Africa and Middle Asia)
Finally, he suggested us to use Hong Kong’s One Country Two System advantages for doing business together with China’s companies, and Office of the Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (外交部特派員公署) both in Hong Kong and foreign countries, as well as, to employ racial minority(ies) (小數族裔).

Prof. Thomas M.H. Chan (Honorary Professor; Director of One Belt One Road Research Institute of Chu Hai College of Higher Education) was the second speaker and his topic named “New developments in the Belt and Road strategy and the relationship between Pearl Delta region and Hong Kong”.

In the beginning, Prof. Chan briefed the history of One Belt One Road launched by President Xi Jinping since 2013. He said China would like to establish a new development model (not like western) for win-win concept. This approach would change the people life mode in countries along the One Belt One Road.

Then Prof. Chan summarized the progress in Belt and Road strategy as following diagrams.

The first country project is Pakistan-China economic corridor. It would open trade routes from Western China and provided China direct access to the Middle East region. China also committed to further add US$50 billion for hydro-power for 10 years. Prof. Chan said once people in Pakistan had electricity, household electric appliances demand would be increased.  

After that Prof. Chan discussed the Iranian plans for railway expansion. China Railway Corporation proposed a China-Iran high speed standard gauge railway of 3,200 kilometer long in Nov 2015.

China’s Belt and Road initiative in ASEAN such as China-Lao Railway was proposed and would like to connect with Thailand and went to the Bangkok from Kunming vertically. However, Japan as competitor with China for the Thailand Railway and didn’t want to connect with Lao. Japan proposed horizontal railway direction.   

Finally, Prof. Chan said China would like to upgrade their industries and not like USA to give up most industries and change to finance services. China also planned for 5G and commercialized by 2020. It would change the world.

Q&A Session
Mr. Joseph Chan said Hong Kong finance supporting facilities (配套設施) was not enough. Seldom Hong Kong enterprises went outside (except Cheung Kong (Holdings) Limited – Infrastructure business and MTR). PPP（Public-Private Partnership）was weak! He said culture was able to lead economic. Finally, he added Quality Assurance could be one of professional service and talent would provide outside to assist such countries development.

Dr. Walter Fung asked about education on One Belt One Road. Prof. Thomas Chan said we needed to change the teachers’’ mine first.  

Participant asked how to control risk. Mr. Joseph Chan said we only performed project carefully and slowly, followed China Enterprises and local rules.
For Hong Kong economic development, Prof. Thomas Chan said our government officers should know the Regional Innovation System.

Reference:
One Belt One Road Research Institute, Chu Hai - https://www.chuhai.edu.hk/introduction
Institute for Entrepreneurship (IfE), PolyU - https://www.polyu.edu.hk/ife/corp/en/strategic_alliance/ceo_aboutus.php
Silk Road Economic Development Research Center - http://www.silkroadresearch.org/
Previous Prof. Thomas Chan talks:
20160903: One Belt One Road Strategy Seminar on IRAN (走出邪惡軸心 - 黑紗背後的伊朗) - https://qualityalchemist.blogspot.hk/2016/09/one-belt-one-road-strategy-seminar-on.html
20160411: PolyU Talk on New “Silk Road” Regional Policies and Infrastructure Politics - https://qualityalchemist.blogspot.hk/2016/04/polyu-talk-on-new-silk-road-regional.html
20151017: CityU EngD Open Forum – Innovation and Entrepreneurship - https://qualityalchemist.blogspot.hk/2015/10/cityu-engd-open-forum-innovation-and.html
20140220: China ICT Innovation and Entrepreneurship Seminar - https://qualityalchemist.blogspot.hk/2014/02/china-ict-innovation-and.html
20111112: 十二五規劃：中國的國民經濟及社會發展藍圖 (Lecture 9) - https://qualityalchemist.blogspot.hk/2011/11/lecture-9.html